Re: [PLUG] Tech jobs and politics, and IT diploma mills

I don't know where your "massive salary" idea came from, but I started at 30,000ドル per year... not bad, but certainly not massive. My beef with teaching are the conditions and budget restrictions.

Compare what you get to work with at your office to what I got to work with at Logan Elementary School (17th & Lindley - Philadelphia). What was lacking in supplies (paper, photocopying, pens, stapler, pencil sharpener worth a damn, crayons, markers, for some subjects... text materials, etc.) I supplemented with my own money. That included supplying the kids with what they lacked (pencils, notebooks, erasers) as well as supplying myself with what the school lacked. You can count on one hand the number of people that had to do that at an office job.

The money for me is not the issue. If teachers had environments across the board on par with what the average office worker goes into, I would have no problem with the salary. I didn't go into the profession for the money. If I did, I would've picked IT right off the bat, since at the time, people were throwing money at IT workers.

Penn/Delco, Central Bucks, Council Rock, etc. are not representative of most districts out there. They are the Utopia that most teachers would like to get into. Try going to Norristown, Philly, Cheltenham, etc. That's the real thing.

I'll bet you have never taught a group of about 30 to 40 kids before (most who bitch about teacher's salaries never have). If not, I encourage you to try it just for half a day. Prepare about 4 periods worth of lessons for the grade of your choice and present it. If there still interested at the end, I will agree with you that teachers get more than they deserve.

"William H. Magill" <magill@mcgillsociety.org> wrote:

On Monday, July 7, 2003, at 01:01 PM, Magnus wrote:
> On Monday, July 7, 2003, at 12:09 PM, Jeffrey J. Nonken wrote:
>> We also pay them mediocre salaries and don't work to keep the good
>> teachers and exclude the bad ones.
>
> About twelve years ago Penn Delco School District published the salary
> of each teach, by name, in the district. Maybe Penn Delco is an
> unusual school district, I don't know, but these teachers were making
> on average about 60,000ドル per year with more vacation time than you or
> I will ever see. My wife's calculus teacher was near the top
> somewhere around 75,000ドル. Hardly mediocre. If you take their annual
> salaries and work them out to hourly dollar figures, these teachers
> were making more than most IT people below management level.

This "underpaid" teachers myth is one of the best cons that the various
Teachers Unions have managed to put across on the public for years.

Even in Philadelphia Public Schools, the starting salaries are enormous
and they go up based on how much education you have (or additional
courses you take) and how long you hang around. The quality of the work
the produce is not part of the consideration.

I have several family members who are Public School teachers in and
around the area and they are constantly complaining that they have to
work "so hard" all year long. And then complain when "snow days" are
used and they are expected to show up for a day or two of their "Summer
Vacation." Don't forget those massive salaries are for 9 months of
work a year.

T.T.F.N.
William H. Magill
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magill@mcgillsociety.org
magill@acm.org
magill@mac.com

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